One of the most common reasons to make a selection is to create an…isolated adjustment.…The easiest way to do this is with an Adjustment layer.…Now throughout the rest of our exercises, I'm going to show you how to…actually create selections.…To start though, I'd like to give you a little bit of context of why you need them.…All right!…I've already selected the sky region in this photo, and like I said, in a…moment, I'll teach you the techniques behind this accurate selection.…Let's go into the Adjustments Panel and really boost the color of the sky.…

I'm going to click the Vibrance adjustment layer, and because I have an active…selection, you'll notice that it automatically applies a mask to that area.…So now as I boost the color in the sky, only the sky is affected and not the…buildings itself. That makes it a lot easier to really bring out the details.…Additionally, I could choose to Reselect the last active selection, making it easy to reload.…

In this case, I'm going to also Inverse that selection, and add a secondary…

Resume Transcript Auto-Scroll

Author

Released

3/12/2012

Practical Photoshop CS5 Selections reveals the importance of making precise selections, whether for masking or making color and tone adjustments, and how to make them with the tools in Adobe Photoshop. Author Rich Harrington shows how to make a basic selection with the Select menu commands and the Marquee, Lasso, and Magic Wand tools, and then refine it with Expand and Contract, Smooth and Feather, Quick Masks, and other controls. The course also covers advanced techniques such as selecting with Color Range and working with channels. Exercise files accompany the course.

Topics include:

Creating masks from selections

Moving a selection

Selecting with the Quick Selection tool

Transforming a selection

Using the Refine Edge command

Selecting a color or tonal range throughout the image

Making a selection with the Pen tool

Saving a selection as an alpha channel

Creating a selection from multiple channels with the Calculations command